China in Africa: The Real Story

(1) A "Land Grabs in Africa" Study that Doesn't Target China. Opening a recent paper on land grabs published by Earth Security, I expected to find the usual sentences about "China" leading the land grab in Africa. I was pleasantly surprised to find nothing of the sort. Instead, a balanced assessment of the risks and of the sources of risk:

"Key investors are private firms and governments from Europe, Africa, the Gulf States, and South and East Asia, and a growing base of institutional investors, sovereign wealth funds, and private wealth owners, generally in deals made with host governments."